We want to make new magnate faster. Let's think about how we can do this.
There are some ways:
1. decrease initial time from 120 sec to 90 sec
2. roll dice (auxiliary timer) from 4 to 2 sec.
3. fortune with choice (auxiliary timer) from 12 to 6
4. choose character, first player (auxiliary timer) from 15 to 10
5. choose character, other players (auxiliary timer) from 7 to 3
It can stimulate slow players to move faster. For newbies (first 20 games) we can leave current timer settings.
What do you think about this?

I would do all of that, but probably leave the initial 120 seconds unchanged, so that players who were away from the computer when the game started have the time to come back and realise they're playing.

In 4/5p, it's really disappointing when one player drops out before the game has even started - especially if it turns into a 3p. I hate 3p!

Especially in 2p, or a multi-player game down to 2p, the game often comes down to scores or hundreds of rolls with no trades or auctions. The players are just using time to test if the long term advantage will give the game to one or the other.

I suggest a set of "Roll-Out" options:
- one option automatically rolls each turn with no delay, until cancelled. (animation is abbreviated or skipped, with the log showing activity.)
- If both players opt for Roll-Out, the game advances in groups of five or ten rolls each, showing a chart with changes in cash and board situation, (like start salary.)
- The Roll-out may be for the duration, the next 10 rolls, until cash hits zero, until start salary goes -150, etc.

Many games the last 20 or 25 minutes is just rolling. These endgames would be truncated with virtually no difference in outcome with a Roll-Out option, especially with no animation or abbreviated animation.

I suggest a set of "Roll-Out" options:
- one option automatically rolls each turn with no delay, until cancelled. (animation is abbreviated or skipped, with the log showing activity.)
- If both players opt for Roll-Out, the game advances in groups of five or ten rolls each, showing a chart with changes in cash and board situation, (like start salary.)
- The Roll-out may be for the duration, the next 10 rolls, until cash hits zero, until start salary goes -150, etc.

Many games the last 20 or 25 minutes is just rolling. These endgames would be truncated with virtually no difference in outcome with a Roll-Out option, especially with no animation or abbreviated animation.

One other roll-out option would be to indicate you wish to roll out, open no auctions, decline all fortunes, and leave the game to finish. The player could then start another game and hear back later how it ended.
Alternatively, the fortune choices could be pre-chosen in a table. For instance, if my opponent has greens and I have white and pink, i set to accept any option which reduces the chance of hitting green, like advancing to the fourth white or black or the start square. Further, the auction option could open any prop where the open price less half the credit value is less than the cost of the current board position, (e.g., start -400, position cost is 10 per square.) This could be jiggered to reflect the average cost of hitting the rents remaining on the lap. (about 40% chance of hitting green on a pass, at 500, cost is 200 per lap. Deciding to open at cyan, half lap avoided, add 100 to bid limit.)
The option window could offer these choices intuitively. Plus, seeing the window game after game would help tutor players in how to think quantitatively about their choices.

Why not just select your choices before the game, leave it to play on automatic and come back later to see the results.
Why play the game at all?

Sigh - yes I'm taking the piss, but sorry if you wanna play the game play it, if not go do something else.

I don't think the game needs altering so much that you end up leaving the system to play out the last few mins of the game on your behalf. I for one if in a good position to fight for 1st when the game is down to 2 players, then fight is what I do. Obviously when theres no fight left I simply leave.

The use of give, and fast auctions would take the game time down. Add more recession cards if thats what you want to speed things up. But I say ultimately don't mess about too much with a perfectly good game that is simply in an outdated interface.

As I've said before using give will speed games up a fair bit. The problem of course is how to encourage players to do so and what possible methods could be used to do this.

1) add some kind of timer to auctions on using give. So if you let the auction finish without having hit give your time would be reduced by a few seconds each time. Not sure how complicated this would be to add, but I think it could be a bit tricky.

2) Highlight players who have hit give in games, so that all users are aware of who is not using give. Peer pressure could then force them to do so. Plus someone who repeatability does this and is seen to be doing so could be blacklisted if this annoys you. Downside of this is it could alter the way people bid once they know someone has already hit give.

3) At the end of the game have a tally of how many auctions and how many times each user hit give before the end of the auction. Again this way could be complicated to implement, but would keep the info out of sight in game and only be known at the end when you could then chose to blacklist the user who has held your game up all the way through.

Tracy, thank you for rising this issue.
I fully agree with your concerns about ignoring "give" button game's style, we should do smth with it. now I couldn't understand how we technically implement your ideas.
Now we are planning to make a remainder with wish to use give during the auction. Also we add pass button (give to all players).
I will discuss idea of auto reminder for nongivers (after 3 auction without using this button player will receive this caution).
Also as I described above we are going to cut timer for experienced players, we will analyze how this alteration will work and maybe we can cut more to make game faster.

[quote="trace567"]Why not just select your choices before the game, leave it to play on automatic and come back later to see the results.
Why play the game at all?

I play the game for the challenge of determining what is the best move at each moment in the constantly changing situation. When the end game is locked up, and the only question is who the dice may favor with an odd run, I would like the result more quickly without spending 20 minutes of my life hitting the roll button with nearly no thought involved.

The joint roll-out situation would end games quickly if both players believed the game is set, and we just need to see who lasts longer with the dice having their effect.

The reason for the walk-away roll-out option is to protect players who civilly recognize the game is probably decided, and would like a quicker finish, from players who insist on rolling each turn, stalling, trying to annoy the other player. With the walk-away option, spoilers would face the situation of stalling against an empty chair, with the other player having left the table, but the game still to be decided by the dice. There would be no advantage to driving the other player away by being rude or annoying, as if the other player had a superior position she would win anyway, even while off playing the next game.

I am not suggesting building a "bot" machine, where each of us just creates and fine-tunes a program that plays the game for us, beginning to end. These end-game options would be for obvious, "well duh" moves that any reasonable player would recognize as optimal in the end-game situation.